MTACR is a member of FBHVC

Helen Almond

1968 Morris Traveller resprayAlthough there was nothing terribly wrong with our 1968 Traveller, there were a few imperfections in the paintwork and the interior was showing the signs of over 40 years of smoking by the original owner, so we decided to give her a bit of a tidy up in time for her 45th birthday.

She trundled off to the paint shop immediately after the Stanford Hall show in September last year, but as we were in no immediate rush to get her back (having lost the use of one of our garages) the goal was to have her ready by spring. The idea was just to give her a rub down and a new coat of paint on the outside and also to paint the visible areas of the inside, but of course this is a Mini we are talking about, so inevitably one thing led to another......

On first inspection the body seemed pretty sound. The woodwork was easily removed and revealed no horrors underneath and it seems that the paint on the car was by and large original, with only one or two areas which had previously been repaired or touched up.

Unfortunately those previous repairs were not to the best standard and when shot blasted revealed a few areas of rot. All the rot has now been cut out and good quality repair panels welded in, and hopefully she will get her paint in the next week or so.

April 2013Our Traveller has been stone chipped underneath and the body is now in primer ready for painting.

May 2013She's now in paint and just needs to be built back up again!

June 2013She's all painted and back together now and off to have new carpets fitted. Then we just need to put the badges and last bits of trim on.

July 2013We collected our Traveller last weekend and took her to the show at Gaydon. Chris at Whights has done a great job on the paintwork and Bryan has fitted good quality period style carpets and retrimmed the dash. She's now sporting a period tax disc in the windscreen and a reproduction dealer sticker in the rear door. We took her to be valued today and are very pleased with the outcome.